Category Archives: Corruption: Domestic

On March 5, 2018, French prosecutors published two Judicial Conventions of Public Interest (“CJIPs” or “French DPAs”) approved by the President of the High Court of Nanterre on February 23. The CJIPs, entered into between prosecutors and two sub-contractors to state-owned utility EDF, SAS Kaefer Wanner (“KW”) and SAS SET Environnement (“SET”), allege that these companies had ceded to solicitations to pay bribes to an EDF procurement manager, and that this behaviour amounted to corruption by them of an individual charged with a public service. KW and SET admitted these facts and their legal qualification[1], and agreed to pay financial penalties of €2,710,000 and €800,000 respectively and compensation to EDF of €30,000 each. In addition, they agreed to submit to monitoring by the French Anti-corruption Agency (“AFA”) for, respectively, 18 and 24 months.

The KW and SET CJIPs are the first to be concluded in respect of corruption offences. Helpfully, they provide (1) detail on the financial incentive of entering into a French DPA for companies with potential exposure for corruption-related offences in France, (2) clarification that co-operation and remediation can significantly reduce the financial penalty, as well as (3) the first examples of monitorships to be supervised by the AFA. However, the crucial question of how a company can qualify for a French DPA remains largely unanswered. Continue reading →

As governments around the world watch the rising tide of public sentiment and law enforcement actions against corruption,[1] some are looking to the United Kingdom Bribery Act 2010 (the “Act”) as a model for crafting their own criminal sanctions, including with regard to corporate criminal liability.[2] Section 7 of the Act, which is captioned, “Failure of commercial organization to prevent bribery,” defines the offense in just 45 words:

A relevant commercial organisation (“C”) is guilty of an offence under this section if a person (“A”) associated with C bribes another person intending—

(a) to obtain or retain business for C, or

(b) to obtain or retain an advantage in the conduct of business for C.[3]

Unless the company, as an affirmative defense, can “prove that [it] had in place adequate procedures designed to prevent persons associated with [it] from undertaking such conduct,”[4] it faces a criminal fine without statutory limit.[5]Continue reading →

In a significant development for companies relating to the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), in late November the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced a new FCPA Corporate Enforcement Policy (the Enforcement Policy).

The Enforcement Policy[1] is designed to encourage companies to voluntarily disclose misconduct by providing greater transparency concerning the amount of credit the DOJ will give to companies that self-report, fully cooperate and appropriately remediate misconduct. Notably, in announcing the Enforcement Policy, the DOJ highlighted the continued critical role that anti-corruption compliance programs play in its evaluation of eligibility under the Enforcement Policy. Continue reading →

This past year marked the 40th anniversary of the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”). Since its enactment in 1977, the U.S. Department of Justice (the “DOJ”) has brought approximately 300 FCPA enforcement actions, while the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) has brought approximately 200 cases.[1] This anniversary year, the first year of the Trump administration, demonstrated that the FCPA continues to be a powerful tool in combating corruption abroad and encouraging compliance at global companies.

On December 20, 2017, President Trump issued a new Executive Order (PDF: 235 KB) (EO) targeting corruption and human rights abuses around the world.

The EO implements last year’s Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act (the Global Magnitsky Act), which authorized the president to impose sanctions against human rights abusers and those who facilitate government corruption.[1] The US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), which will administer the EO, also added 15 individuals and 37 entities to its Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List (SDN List). Continue reading →

On November 29, 2017, Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein announced that the US Department of Justice (DOJ) has implemented a permanent, revised version of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) Pilot Program.[1] The Pilot Program — which was launched as a one-year trial in April 2016 by then-Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division (and now Latham partner) Leslie Caldwell — was extended indefinitely in April 2017 to allow DOJ to evaluate the program’s efficacy.[2] Rosenstein announced that the enhanced policy — now called the FCPA Corporate Enforcement Policy (PDF: 51 KB) (FCPA Policy) — will be incorporated into the United States Attorneys’ Manual (USAM). Like its predecessor, the FCPA Policy aims to encourage companies to make timely and voluntary disclosures of wrongdoing under the FCPA, while providing additional concrete incentives rewarding corporations for cooperation.

This policy announcement is likely the first of several DOJ policy changes and/or enhancements under the new administration. As detailed in Latham’s October 2017 Client Alert (PDF: 93.58 KB), Rosenstein recently announced that DOJ was reviewing a wide range of existing corporate enforcement policies, including the Pilot Program, DOJ’s policy on “Individual Accountability for Corporate Wrongdoing” (the Yates Memo), and other DOJ policies and memoranda — with the intention of ultimately incorporating the revised policies into the USAM. Continue reading →

Good afternoon, and thank you for inviting me to speak today. Before I begin, let me give the required disclaimer that the views I express here today are my own and do not necessarily represent the views of the Commission or its staff.[1]

I am honored to be here to mark with you the 40th anniversary of the enactment of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and the 20th year of the OECD anti-bribery convention. I want to thank New York University’s Program on Corporate Compliance and Enforcement for hosting this event. Programs like this one provide important forums for dialogue on critical enforcement issues, and I am pleased that this gathering has assembled so many familiar and distinguished practitioners in FCPA enforcement, our colleagues in domestic and international law enforcement, and academics who are interested in this space. Collaboration and coordination is integral to the Division of Enforcement’s efforts to combat bribery through the enforcement of the FCPA, and the OECD has played a pivotal role in fostering global efforts against bribery and corruption.

It is a pleasure to be here today. I want start to by thanking the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) for co-organizing this event with the Department of Justice. I also want to thank the New York University School of Law for hosting us.

Today, I have the honor and the privilege of speaking with you as the Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division of the United States Department of Justice.

As many of you know, the Criminal Division spearheads the Department’s efforts in financial investigations, transnational crime, health care fraud, securities fraud, intellectual property theft, computer hacking, money laundering, sanctions violations, illicit finance, asset recovery, and, of course, the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and kleptocracy initiative, to name just a few areas in which we are leading.

On Election Day, the modern State treats every citizen in the same terms—we all get one vote. This political fact serves as a reminder that the principle of democracy is intimately related to another principle, that of equality.

Vote buying, electoral intimidation, and other undesired practices remain a challenge for young democracies. That said, the principle of equality before government faces its biggest challenge during election periods. On a regular basis, phrases like “who do you know?” determine the way that public servants treat citizens. Continue reading →

Effective anti-corruption compliance programs include protections for whistleblowers that raise corruption concerns. Article 13.3 of Russia‘s 2008 Federal Law No. 273-FZ on Counteracting Corruption (the “Anti-Corruption Law”) addressed Russian lawmakers’ expectations regarding effective compliance programs.[1] But the law was silent on whistleblower protections. Recently proposed legislation in Russia may help address this gap.

Even before the Anti-Corruption Law came into effect, Russian law included several provisions that could be interpreted to provide some protection for whistleblowers. For example, Russian employment law prohibits discrimination and sets out an exhaustive list of permissible grounds for dismissing an employee for cause; firing an employee for blowing the whistle on potential corruption is not among them. As a result, firing an employee for whistleblowing could ran afoul of Russian employment law. In addition, the Russian government can protect individuals whose security might be threatened as a result of their participation in criminal proceedings that involve alleged corruption. The state might, for example, provide such witnesses with physical protection, relocate them, or even give them new identities. Continue reading →